Motherhood, Craftiness & Other Lovely Things

beads

Hello dears! I have some more great Dollar Tree finds from a recent trip. This time, it’s all craft supplies!

Adorable floral fabric tape — makes my heart go pitter patter.

I was very impressed with the selection of arts and crafts supplies for kids (…aaaaand adults who have no shame in their crafting game). That assortment of modeling clay! ONE DOLLAR for all those colors. I mean, I have no idea what to do with it, but I couldn’t resist. We’ll figure it out. I bought the beads and thread for Maddie to make some friendship bracelets.

Pom poms — again, with the no plan or purpose for these things. Ideas?

My recent tutorial for these Easy Floral Letters used flowers I bought on this shopping trip. I didn’t find ALL of these flowers there, but most of them! Those sunflowers, large hot pink and purple flowers… nice sized bunches for a buck. You really can’t beat it.

Have you found anything great at your dollar store lately? Let us all know in the comments!

The Inspiration:

Supplies:

Misc. beads, chains, and other findings from old broken necklaces, used for flower centers

A thick piece of ribbon for the flower base

Two eyelets (found at your craft store) for attaching the chains to your base

A lobster clasp and jump ring — I used these from a broken necklace.

Needle and thread

Patience. A freaking lot of it.

Instructions:

1. Begin cutting the fabric, making circles of various sizes. I used about 10-12 circles for each flower, the largest being roughly 3 inches in diameter, but feel free to make them smaller, larger, or use different amounts. And for heaven’s sake, don’t torture yourself and worry about them being perfect! They’ll be a little frayed and uneven, and that’s just fine.

2. Stack 10-12 of the fabric circles, starting with the largest at the bottom and gradually becoming smaller as you go. Repeat until you have 4 nice little piles.

3. Run your needle and thread through from the back, then go back down through the front. Make a few of these stitches until you feel it’s secure.

4. While holding the fabric from the back side, pinch the whole thing in half and make a few stitches through the fold, close to the center of the flower. Do this a few more times until you get the whole puckered, petal look going on. (How do you like my very technical instructions? I’m so not a pro at this, haha.)

“The whole puckered, petal look”

5. Now for the fun part… decorating those flowers! String the beads on your thread and run your needle back and forth through the center until you get the look you want. You can use beads of any shape, size and color for this. Go crazy… no one will judge you. :)

The next step is to make the base for the flowers.

6. Take a strip of the thick ribbon and two eyelets. Cut a tiny hole at the edge of the ribbon and attach an eyelet. This will be where your chained bracelets attach to the base.

Note: Eyelets are available at your local craft store and are surprisingly easy to use. They come with directions too, so don’t be intimidated!

7. Now, run a few stitches through the backs of each flower to secure them to the ribbon. There’s no rhyme or reason to this and doesn’t have to look pretty, just be sure each flower is stitched on there nice and tight.

Now that you know how wide your flowers are when they’re all lined up, you can trim the unfinished end of the ribbon (the one without the eyelet). Repeat Step 6 and secure the remaining eyelet to the ribbon. When you’re finished, go ahead and clasp the other chained bracelet through the eyelet hole.

8. Take the jump ring, bend it open and hook it through the lobster clasp.

9. Now hook the jump ring through the end of one of the chained bracelets and close it.